Tuesday, March 31, 2009

The Vampire's Crypt of Erie Cemetery

From hauntings , close encounters to UFOs, Bigfoot sightings and Bessie the lake monster, the county is full of high strangeness.

But one of the most mysterious places of supernatural legend in the county is the Vampire's Crypt that lies in The Erie Cemetery between 26th and 19th streets.

Now the cemetery has its share of unique tombs, Erie was a chief industrial town in the 1800s and the wealth of the city is evident in the many lavish personal mausoleums the cemetery holds.

But the Vampire's Crypt stands out from even the most lavish of tombs.

It is not because it is the most ornate, no on the contrary its fairly sparse-it even lacks a family name. But over the doorway is an ornate "V", that has given it its infamous name.

There are many stories of supernatural and odd experiences at the Crypt, and with this entry I am going to try something a little different, an animated video blog.

For more info on the Vampire's Crypt, it's background and other stories about the supernatural occurrences there read this article of mine on the Examiner: http://www.examiner.com/article/what-lurks-the-vampire-s-crypt and the full story in my book "Eerie Erie: Tales of the Unexplained from Northwestern Pennsylania" due August 2011 from The History Press!

Well, I have to honestly say that I'm a bit dissappointed Pastor Swope, but not because I didn't have a high opinion of the video, just that I couldn't watch it!! LOL. Is it on youtube? I read your blog from work and my company has youtube blocked because the IT folks say that watching youtube videos takes up too much bandwidth and cause company wide internet problems and destroys our speed if many people get on it. So when I read the title of this thread I got really excited, only to be letdown :( .....Ah well, better luck next time I reckon, lol. Thanks for the links though, I guess I'll have to make do with those.

I love it! theres nothing like a good vampire story.What are your views on them Pastor Swope? do you think they exist or are they just one of the worlds oldest horror villains?

On a technical note I'm interested in the program you used to make your animations? Is it a version of the Sims game where you get to direct your own video? It would be something I'd love to get into.(however I understand if you don't want to give away the tricks of your trade)

Sorry, this one was disappointing. There's nothing particularly paranormal about wild dogs, nor about a floral design that teenagers enjoy misinterpreting. And yellow journalism does not become credible when it becomes old.

When you talk about events within your own experience, or within the direct experience of those whom you know to be trustworthy, your stories are better.

hi my name is leo and i am very interested in the paranormal and i am going to go to the erie cemetery on halloween and i wana know more myths if you know any and what exactly happens in that myth then please send a coment back i am very interested

i have had experiences with the paranormal before like once i was little i was about 3 or 4 years old and i saw a blue mist infront of me it called out to me then all of a sudden disappeard. another story is once while we had the whole family over and we had everyone in the same room no one was upstairs or any where else in the house then we all heard a bloody murder scream coming from the attic then all of a sudden a little girl appeared at the top of the stairs and slowly went down the stairs then at the top of the second flight she screamed then she dissapeared at that second the power went out for no reason and if you wana know what happened next and more stories leave me a comment

I've lived in erie pa all my life and grew up a half a block away from the cemetary (it was my playground). We heard all the stories at a young age. So of course we tried to find out. As a kid (now 35 and still in erie) i smoked my first cigarette on the roof of that grave, drank beers on that grave, done all kinds of things on that grave. I was always a lil creepy, but i have never seen or heard a damn thing.

Hi, I used to go into this cemetary as a teenager and write poetry while sitting on the steps. Always had a feeling of being watched but was never attacked. I was just drawn to the gothic beauty of the tomb and never knew its belief until an adult!!

An Exorcist's Field Guide

About The Paranormal Pastor

is a Writer and has been a Christian Minister for more than 25 years in both Mainline and Evangelical Denominations. He holds a B.A. in Biblical Literature from Nyack College and an M.Div. In Pastoral Ministry with an emphasis on Pastoral Counseling from Alliance Theological Seminary. He has served as a short term Missionary to Burkina Faso, and has Ministered to the homeless in New York City's Hell's Kitchen. He is currently the Pastor of St.Paul's United Church of Christ in Erie, Pennsylvania.
He is also a freelance journalist for Examiner.com, has a column in the Tri-State Senior News and has also written for Fate Magazine.
As a Seminary trained exorcist he has done consulting work with various paranormal investigators and television productions in the United States as well as investigators and writers across the globe